Mr. D'Amato - My Education Blog

 The book that I am reviewing for the realistic fiction module is called "¡Fiesta!" by  Ginger Foglesong Guy. There are many reasons that I chose this book, but one of the main reasons was because it is bilingual which can be a very important aspect in elementary schools. It is common to have English Learners within your elementary classroom and to help them learn English it could be useful to have bilingual books. This type of book also exposes all of the students to different types of culture and languages that they may not be familiar with. The book has two different sets of text on each page, one is in English and the other is in Spanish. Therefore, no student is at a disadvantage and since the students are young this could benefit them in the near future when they are learning another language. This book does a great job of being interactive with the audience which will help keep all of the students engaged with the book while the teacher is reading. It also incorporates

Why is it important to include many cultures in realistic fiction? Good realistic fiction books provide the opportunity for all students to be able to connect with the text; many cultures have different societal norms that are expected or acted upon. By allowing students to connect with the text, then they will feel that their culture is represented properly within the text. By involving many other cultures in realistic fiction you are allowing for students to also learn about different cultures that they may not be familiar with. When you familiarize students with different cultures then it will make it more normal and comfortable for everyone when they recognize the differences in real life. This also helps students appreciate the differences in cultures and will help them understand why one person may have a certain point of view in comparison to someone else from a different culture. In order for realistic fiction to be a genre for all people then it must include all different type

Duke Ellington by Andrea Davis Pinkney was a great biography to read and would work well for most elementary-aged students. This book combines the use of pictures on every single page while also providing the students with great information about Duke Ellington's musical career. The book attempts to connect with the audience by starting off with his childhood and what he liked to do. This will help engage the students and hopefully inspire them to be great like Duke Ellington. It also talks about Duke Ellington and how his parents wanted him to do certain things that he did not want to do; almost every child deals with this at some point so it should be relatable to the students. I believe that all of the students in the classroom even if they do not want to become musicians would enjoy this book because of the message that it is sending. There is also a magical feeling to the story; Andrea Pinkey wrote it in positive terms and is eager to share the positive outcomes even after sha

      First, they use a picture of MLK when they are introducing what the read-aloud is going to be about; this helps put a face to the story for anyone listening. When they brought up what he noticed when he was younger they put up a picture/animation of him and his mother. Then the video switches to a picture of what the read-aloud is actually saying; this way the person watching the video can briefly read along.       Throughout the video, they switch between pictures of what is going on and pictures of the text. This is basically an interactive picture book that encourages both reading along and taking advantage of the use of pictures to better understand the story.      In some scenes, they combine the pictures and the text to go along with each other. This gives a choice to the audience, they can either read along or just listen and look at the pictures. This is traditionally how picture books are interpreted when being read live.      The switching between pictures and text is v